


One Last Dance

by idelthoughts



Series: When the Dance is Over [1]
Category: Forever (TV)
Genre: F/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2015-02-24
Updated: 2015-02-24
Packaged: 2018-03-14 23:08:57
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,668
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/3428942
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/idelthoughts/pseuds/idelthoughts
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Abigail considered leaving him a letter, but in the end she owed him a proper goodbye.</p>
            </blockquote>





	One Last Dance

**Author's Note:**

> I had too many post-1x16 emotions, and they had to go somewhere.

Abigail sits him down, because she knows he’ll not take this well, so he might as well be sitting.    
  
Bless him, he has that same doe-eyed softness about him he always has with her these days, as though he can drag them through this on sheer force of will.  Maybe it was a conscious decision on his part at some point, but now it’s become his way; a great thick cloak of denial, complete with a blindfold to keep him from seeing the truth.  
  
She’s not happy.  Neither of them is, really, but he doesn’t listen.  He stopped listening years ago, because the moment he accepts it, that’s the moment the fantasy ends.  They both know it, but only she is willing to face it.  
  
“How was your day?” he asks, and leans down to kiss her before he sits on the couch next to her, an arm around her shoulders along the back of the couch.  
  
Home from work, same as always.  She retired seven years ago, and yet he’s still packing lunches and heading off to work.  A paediatric practice now, his arms always full of babies and young children, spending his days surrounded by couples in the prime of life.  
  
Like he still is.  Like they both were, once upon a time.  She is certain that when he looks at her he still sees 1945 and the moment they first met.  She wonders if he’s ever stopped seeing that, if he’s ever really seen the years as they pass.    
  
She closes her eyes because this is too hard to do, and yet it has to be done.  It’s time he does listen.  They both need to live their lives, and neither one of them is doing it now, too busy caught trying to fight against the tide of their differing needs, pulling them apart with the irresistible strength nature exerts on even the most unwilling.  
  
“Henry, the time has come.”  
  
He’s silent a moment, and then he shuffles closer to her and places another kiss on her temple.  He’s always touching her; he’s always been affectionate, but now it’s constant, as though she’ll disappear the moment he lets go.  
  
He’s right.  She will, and they both know it.  
  
“Rough day?” he asks softly.  
  
And that is the way it is now.  She tries to talk about the truth, and Henry brings it back to the mundane, the daily grind, as though her discontent is the result of traffic, or battling a clogged sink, or a rude clerk at the grocery store souring her mood.  If she lets them, tears will come, and she can’t do this like that.  He has to understand that this is real.  For once, he needs to understand.  
  
“No.  You know what I mean, Henry.  We can’t do this anymore.”  
  
“Darling,” he murmurs into her hair—greying now, she’s finally let go of trying to be the bottle blonde she’s been for years, because vanity is slipping away with her youth,  “darling, no.  We’ve talking about this—“  
  
“I’ve talked.  You’ve not listened.”  
  
He freezes and she pulls away, shuffling to stand, and turns to face him on the couch.  
  
There’s fear in his eyes.  Real fear.  Oh, this is killing her.  He understands now, the poor boy.  
  
And when had she begun to think of her husband in those terms?  He might be older than her, but he’s never ceased to live life as a vibrant young man.  Likely it’s helped him survive all these years, to keep himself going.  And he’s tried to keep her going too, but she’s tired.  She’s too tired to live with a man who still insists he can take her dancing, can do long walks in the park with her while her hips ache, who tries but fails to understand that every day is more of a struggle.    
  
But he’s still trying, and fighting to keep her.  She’s too tired to keep up.  She needs to let him go, let him run, while she can sit and enjoy the life she has left without the constant guilt of keeping him caged with her in her old age.  
  
“Abigail, please.  You know this isn’t necessary.  I love you, whatever you need from me, you have it.”  
  
His sincerity runs so deep, his belief so absolute, that she’s sure he means it.  She knows he would, he’d stay with her to the end.  But she can’t watch that; it would kill her all the faster to live her life leaning on Henry’s arm until time has its way with her, watching him try to give up on life to match her steps to the grave.    
  
Being with him makes her feel her mortality all the more.  She should be living her life too, as she can, as she should, instead of seeing the end as an inevitable destination.  She has many days to live yet, but she’s not living them any more than he is.  
  
“Henry, I’m going to leave.  Tomorrow.”  
  
His face pales faster than she thought possible, the truth of her words hitting him like that damned shot to the chest that robbed him of a normal life.  If she could unwrite his history and go back to make sure it killed him, she thinks she would.  She’d not trade him and Abe for anything, but she’s sure no one should have had to live through the pain Henry’s lived through.  Even love can’t compensate for some things.  
  
He stands, reaching for her, and now he is truly frightened.  
  
“No—no.  Abigail, you can’t possibly mean it.”  
  
“I do.  My bags are packed, my arrangements made.”  
  
He grips her shoulders, rubbing down her arms in a motion that’s meant to reassure her, but instead is possessive, clinging, until he catches her hands and holds them tight.  His hands are shaking and his eyes are wide.  
  
“Till death do us part.  I meant it.  I meant it with all my heart.  Please, there’s no need for this.”  
  
“There is.  And that you can’t see it makes me terrified for what would happen if I stay.”  
  
He lets go of her, his hand coming to rub at his forehead, the other on his hip, and he turns away from her, starting to pace.  So much energy in him still, so much fight.  He walks around the couch while she waits.  He pivots suddenly, striding back to her, and there’s tears in his eyes, his terror overtaking him.    
  
“You can’t do this.  Please, you can’t.  You can’t leave me.”  
  
“I have to, Henry.  We both know it.”  
  
“I don’t know it!” he shouts, and his voice cracks.  He closes his eyes and gulps a breath, pulling back, trying to reel it in, until he opens them again, raising his hands peaceably.  “I’m sorry.  But Abigail, no.”  
  
He says it with that decisive tone he gets with Abe when he thinks he is right, that he can settle the matter with his word of law.  She smiles because it is so very childish, almost laughable.  She’s let him decide for too long, let him hide the inevitable from them both.  It’s over now, and she’s done.  He knows it too, or he wouldn’t be so scared.  He was never scared when he knew he had nothing to lose—even if he knew it because the blindfold of denial was tied so tight he couldn’t see a thing through it.    
  
“We can either spend this evening fighting, or we can spend it pleasantly.”  
  
He is struck silent, his mouth open, no words coming from it, and his hands slowly lower to his sides.  His shoulders sag, and he can only stare at her.  
  
She knows in that instant she’s defeated him, ripped the blindfold free.  And that’s when the truth hits her too.  She starts to cry, her chin falling to her chest, and all the tears she’d meant to keep for the next day when she climbed aboard the airplane bound for England start to fall.  
  
He slowly moves to her and wraps his arms around her.  
  
“Please,” he begs softly, rocking her.  “Please change your mind.  I can’t do this without you.  I’ll do anything, please.”  
  
He knows he’s lost, or he would present her with all the same tired arguments, all the thousands of ways he’s constructed in his mind to show her how it works.  
  
She musters the last of her courage and lifts her head.  He’s a mess, tears on his face, his lip trembling.  He’s always worn his heart on his sleeve.  She cups his face the way she did so long ago, the way she did when he’d first kissed her, and now it’s her that pulls him into a kiss.  Soft, gentle, nothing like the passion they shared then, but still full of as much love as she had for him from that first moment.  No, more; it’s only grown with each day.  That, at least, has never faded.  
  
“You have to, Henry.”  
  
He breaks down then, real sobs coming, and she pulls him close, a hand to the soft brown hair that’s never greyed, as he cries into her shoulder, clinging to her, and her own grief pulls her down again.  They’re a sorry pair, the two of them.  She hopes they can find something good in the hours they have left.  She’d considered leaving him a letter, just running away to avoid this horrible pain, but in the end, she owed him a goodbye.  She owed it to herself.  And, she hoped, a few good memories to carry them through the hard parts to come.  
  
She still has the pocket watch to give him, the miracle she’d found at the auction.  A piece of his history, something he’d always mourned losing.  Maybe getting it back will help.  
  
And for herself, a dance.  One last dance.  He’s always been a wonderful dancer, and it’s the memory she’d like to take with her.  
  
But for now, he cries, and so does she.  


End file.
